Scotland ‘open for business’

Nicola Sturgeon is to launch a trade offensive in the EU as part of a campaign to tell Europe that Scotland is “open for business”.

The move, which is due to be revealed in her keynote speech to the SNP conference today, will be seen as an effort by the First Minister to go it alone in striking trade deals in the EU, outside the UK umbrella.

Ms Sturgeon will outline a four-point plan to boost trade links with EU countries.

It includes doubling the number of Scottish trade and investment staff in Europe from 20 to 40, establishing a permanent envoy in Berlin and setting up a board of trade made up of “prominent” Scots.

The announcement comes amid growing concern about the potential economic impact of the UK-wide vote to leave the EU.

Ms Sturgeon said the “deeply damaging” rhetoric coming from a Tory Government pursuing a hard Brexit means that Scotland has to send the message across the Continent that it is “open for business”.

“Make no mistake, the growth of our economy right now is threatened not just by the prospect of losing our place in the single market...” she is expected to tell Glasgow’s SECC.

“It is also the deeply damaging – and utterly shameful – message that the Tories’ rhetoric about foreign workers is sending.

“And the uncertainty that message brings to our public services and Scottish employers. More than ever, we need to tell our European friends that Scotland is open for business.”

Scottish Conservative John Lamont said higher taxes and the agitation for leaving the UK shows that Scotland is “anything but open for business under the SNP”.